


I Am Become

by orphan_account



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Historical References, Manipulation, Parent/Child Incest, Rape/Non-con Elements, Sex Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-06 03:03:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20499809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Gertrude isn't the type to give up an ally without something to learn or an asset to gain.





	I Am Become

**Author's Note:**

  * For [plutonianshores](https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutonianshores/gifts).

She remained vividly conscious through it all. The drugs did little to mask the pain. It likely would have been cheating even if they had, but she couldn’t keep herself from trying—a final, pathetic, human urge to turn away. The room, empty as it was, reeked no longer of dirt and burial. The Powers and her bled rich iron, heavy soot. She was never alone as she screamed and cried and so carefully tore herself from her form. The darkness settling did not do so lightly, incompletely. Doubt weaseled its way in like it always did, and by the time her boy returned, she was not above begging. There was more work to be done than she had time. He left her there on the floor.

And so, Mary Keay ended. And so she was reborn.

Mary had described the sensation well, all those years ago. The discomfort of being in such close contact with a Leitner and the End was expected, of course, but Mary’s conjuring itself occurs within a twist of the eye.

Death is unbecoming of Mary, Gertrude concludes. Besides the rather extreme appearance, which had been quite a shock the first time she’d visited, it seems to have knocked out that last bit of goodness in her, or, more accurately, any pretence of the sort. Still, way Gerard spoke of her—as if she were a rabid animal—didn’t do her justice, either. Mary carries the same deep energy of any powerful avatar only more focused now, and when Gertrude looks past the milk-poisoned glaze of her eyes, the sharpness of Mary is just the same, too. She takes one look at the familiar book in Gertrude’s hands before sneering and saying, “Well, I suppose there has been something of a coup in my absence.”

“Quite,” Gertrude replies. She watches as Mary reached for her letter opener, only for it to—well, nothing as cartoonish as her hand phasing through Gertrude’s desk, but clearly being called forth when already weakened limits her options. Good. “I’ll be honest with you, Mary. Despite your doubts, your boy has turned into quite the force in recent years. I believe he would be a great asset for the Archive, but for that to happen, he is quite convinced that you need to be… removed from his path.

“I believe we know each other well enough now that it would be an insult for me to act hesitant, and a waste of your time to doubt my ability. However, there are questions I would like answered, if you’re willing.”

“‘If I’m willing,’” Mary scoffs. She takes a long moment to look around Gertrude’s office. Nothing new, except that Gertrude had been careful to remove any sensitive objects that Mary may be able to influence. Finally, Mary says, “Are you_ asking, _ dear?”

“Would you like me to?”

“Might as well, for old time’s sake.”

The room falls silent. Both knew any fondness she ever had for Mary wouldn’t stop her from completing her goals for the night. Not that fondness was quite the word the word to begin with, but how else did one summarize decades of allyship, strained as they were? Familiarity? Solidarity? Understanding?

After a deep inhale, Gertrude says, “What changed between you and Gerard?”

Mary exhales with a smooth mimicry. “I suppose you wouldn’t buy some simple family drama, would you?"

> My Gerard has always been… difficult. Brilliant, but difficult. Perhaps I underestimated dear Erik’s worth, because those first years were a horrid drain. I wondered if he had been claimed before I’d even gotten the chance, some different face of the Lonely or the Stranger finally trapping me in, but he was just… a baby with colic. As a toddler, he swung maddeningly between disregard and claustrophobic neediness.
> 
> As a child, he could at least be bargained with at least, although he remained resistant to my lessons. It was infuriating at times. Here was this boy who I brought into this world and to whom I could gift the greatest insight into our world, and he threw tantrums about not being entrapped within a standard primary school?
> 
> The answer came not long after Gerard started making noise about sixth form — quite an obvious play, looking back. Might as well have found the thing on my pillow covered in webs. As it were, we were in Spain looking to make some purchases of the standard variety. I don’t know if you ever had the pleasure of conducting business with Sebastián Alba, but it wasn’t exactly a surprise when negotiations began to drag.
> 
> Gerard sulked with the sort of teenaged ferocity that could taint a whole room, even if he wasn’t picking another fight about me “dooming his soul” or some other such nonsense. I left him to it while I went to explore the city. It hadn’t been my first visit to Madrid, but a good wander has the habit of getting you where you need to be.
> 
> I found myself at the Plaza Mayor, which itself wasn’t terribly surprising. King Philip II himself designated it to be the heart of Hapsburg Madrid in the late 1500s, and so it stood, barring a fire or three — a display of power and structure within uniformity. Of course, it was King Philip III who completed the task and whose statue stands at the square’s centre, despite being a far lesser ruler. But I suppose that’s what we do it all for, isn’t it?
> 
> While I was stood there, a woman approached me. She looked around my age, although with the sort of paint and pinning that spoke to a bourgeois background. You know well as I do that there comes a point where people begin to avoid those of us within the business, but she walked right up to me along with the young man on her arm, although his gaze was cast demurely downward.
> 
> She spoke with an American accent as she said, “I believe you need this more than I do anymore.”
> 
> And then she pressed a small, warm coin into my hand before bustling her boy away again, merging back into the crowd as if she had never noticed me at all.
> 
> The coin looked old, time-worn, but I could still make out a carving of the Madonna, admittedly a rather nontraditional one, along with the Latin inscription, “Which Mars awards others, Venus transfers to you.”
> 
> There was little doubt in my mind that I held an artefact with significant power. I turned the coin over and over between my fingers as I made my way back to the hotel, allowing my head to be filled with ideas about the fundamental nature of mothers — to raise, to guide, to mould — and the abject horror that drives our creations away from us. As if the blood from my womb hadn’t nurtured him at his most precious.
> 
> Gerard had hardly moved by the time I returned to the room. His back was turned toward the door, and in that moment, it enraged me. Such a simple gesture, one that easily could have been perfectly innocent, but I knew it was a slight to me, to everything I’d ever taught him.
> 
> The contempt was just as plain on Gerard’s face when I turned him onto his back. I felt powerful straddling his legs as his eyes went wide and confused, disbelieving as I rolled my hips. I doubt he’d ever even considered me a woman before that moment.
> 
> “Mum,” he said. Almost begged, even. It wasn’t something he called me, not since he was a boy. Usually, he stuck with Mary or a sneered _ Mother. _The vulnerability lit something within me, lighter and warmer and deeper than I’d ever known before.
> 
> I held the coin in my mouth and watched as the fight he’d begun to put up drained out him, everywhere except his eyes. I’ll spare you the more carnal details—unless you want them, of course, dear—but I took him in my hand, and then within myself. We became one being again, the most intimate closed circle.
> 
> The Mother makes it hard to keep track of who’s in control, doesn’t she? Maybe it would be easier or more acceptable if I said absolutely that the events earlier in the day drove my actions in the hotel absolutely, and that I was horrified with myself once I’d realized what we had done.
> 
> As it is, we both know I enjoy a good scuffle. That afternoon would not be the last dance, so to speak, and while the coin did give me some amount of influence, it was not as complete as I may have liked. Still, it was enough to keep my Gerard from ever flying too far from the nest.
> 
> Or at least it was for the better part of two decades. Then he began to fall more and more into your lot, and I began to turn my attention more fully towards the book. Once I reawoke, it was clear that what was left of my influence had completely deteriorated.

“And now, here we are. I had wondered if the Spider simply didn’t feel like sharing anymore, but now, I’m sure Her favour had simply turned. I can’t even say I’m particularly surprised; I did some research at one point. The woman who I’d met at the plaza turned out to be a formerly up-and-coming starlet in Hollywood. You might have heard of her, even before her son butchered her shortly after an extended Mediterranean vacation in the 1980s,” Mary concluded. 

Her posture loosened as the Beholding turned away, but it still isn’t quite easy. Her eyes glanced between Gertrude, her book still in Gertrude’s hands, a lighter sitting on her desk — not the one she would use, but a solid guess. What was it Mary said the first time they discussed the book? That death just wasn’t interesting enough for her? Gertrude wonders, vaguely, if her opinion has changed now that she’s facing the real thing. It’s not as thrilling an idea as it once was, even after hearing her final statement.

Gertrude has heard and witnessed and committed herself almost unimaginable horrors against fellow man, but looking at Mary now still soured her stomach. Leave it to Mary to always leave her speechless. She had known Gerard for the entirety of his life, even if they hadn’t been in particularly consistent contact until recently. 

Still, Gertrude supposes the mechanics of it isn’t terribly surprising. Fear and the taboo aren’t so unrelated. She turns the book over in her hands. Gerard had given her as much information as he could about the thing, along with all of Mary’s new quirks that came along with it. He had never mentioned the particulars of his motivations. Never given her nor artefact storage any coin.

Perhaps she would keep this statement in her personal collection. That which needed to know already knew, and certainly the fewer people who thought to bend sex this way, the better.

Still, Gertrude has one more question. “How does this thing work, specifically? You’ve always been so vague before.”

Mary smiles, and although it is an empty look, she says, “You are familiar with the less famous works of Oppenheimer, I’m sure?”


End file.
